With writers Banu Mushtaq and Deepa Bhasthi winning the International Booker Prize earlier this year, composer and 2025 Padma Shri awardee Ricky Kej and singer Varijashree Venugopal receiving Grammy nominations and Rishab Shetty’s Kantara: A Legend Chapter 1 becoming a nationwide hit, this year has so far been a big one for Karnataka. As the state observes Kannada Rajyotsava today, CE explores the works of Kannada artistes that shaped eminent personalities across various fields.
I grew up on stories that my grandmother, Hemavathi, told me. I was introduced to literature long before I could read myself. I came to reading for pleasure in Kannada quite late and the single most influential work for me has been Kuvempu’s Malegalalli Madumagalu (1967), in the original. The world-building in the novel, how radical it was when it came out and still is, the exquisite language...I could go on fawning over it. In fact, if I ever need a reminder of the beauty of Kannada, I only have to read a few lines of the book and I fall back in love with my language all over again.
Composer B Ajaneesh Loknath’s Aleya Kare for Gandhada Gudi (2022) has been on my Spotify playlist for at least the last three years. It’s a piece that’s ambient with no percussion in it. It’s got lush strings and lots of electronica and the vocal performances in both versions are beautiful. I love listening to it while I’m taking off or landing on a plane. It transports you to a different world. Because I’ve worked with Ajaneesh before, it feels like it’s one of those pieces he has created in just a few hours and done it very instinctively, because it really touches the heart.
Kannada theatre songs have had a lasting impact on me. Being from a theatre family, these songs were always being during gatherings. The sense of community is strong when you sing them. If you want to listen to live Kannada music or watch Kannada plays, you can start by choosing a venue that you have not been to before. Bengaluru has places that have multilingual programmes and ones that focus only on Kannada. You can choose to alternate the two. That way, you can get a hang of the different worlds that coexist in the city.
The very first Kannada film I remember watching in a theatre is Bhootayyana Maga Ayyu (1974), featuring actors Lokesh and Vishnuvardhan. I was floored by the whole thing – the values it highlighted, like how greed doesn’t help at all, and the climax where they recreated a flood scene without VFX. In those days, to watch that kind of filmmaking was incredible. Among recent films, Thithi (2015) is worth revisiting. We are conditioned as viewers to expect a way of narration and storytelling in films, but Thithi broke all of that. They did something phenomenal using non-actors.
Growing up in the ’60s and ’70s, with no television, meant we watched only two or three films a year, on the big screen – the Laurel & Hardy, Pink Panther cartoons kind. The rare full feature in Kannada would typically be a Dr Rajkumar or Dwarakish film. I’ve remained a fan ever since. I remember how I cried when I watched Sri Krishnadevaraya (1970). I was 8 or 9 years old. Later, of course, Gandhada Gudi (1973), Mayura (1976), and Naagarahaavu (1972) with Vishnuvardhan. I would try to walk like him. I must also mention the many other Puttanna Kanagal films – Belli Moda (1967), Gejje Pooje (1969), Sharapanjara (1971). The late ’60s and ’70s saw a slew of art films, mostly based on celebrated novels – Pattabhi Rama Reddy’s Samskara (1970), Girish Karnad’s Vamsha Vriksha (1971), BV Karanth’s Chomana Dudi (1975) and GV Iyer’s Hamsageethe (1975); I would recommend these too.
